Billionaires Dollar Series

Looking myself over in the mirror, I split my bangs so they form more of a sideswept look. Imagine myself in a pair of heels…

“I think I found the dress.”

“You already have,” he replies. “The purple one.”

I pull the curtain back and lean against the side of the cubicle, pushing the slitted leg out. “Come again?”

Liam does a double take. His gaze rakes me from top to bottom, and the heat that blooms in it makes me shiver.

It feels so good to be wanted.Property of Nô)(velDr(a)ma.Org.

“Maddie…” he says, putting down his phone.

“It’s nice, right?” I walk barefoot onto the padded carpet, turning to give him the full three-sixty view. My blood is beating with adrenaline.

“Gorgeous,” he murmurs.

I watch him in the mirror, sitting behind me. “Come here,” I say. “I want to see if I match you.”

He raises an eyebrow but does as I say. He’s tall beside me, the button of his suit jacket undone. A hint of a tan plays across his skin.

He slides his arm around my waist as we watch ourselves in the mirror, my red dress and his tailored suit.

“You match me,” he says. “You always have.”

And I’m the one who has to swallow at that, looking at him in the mirror and seeing him look right back at me.

“Only took ten dresses to find the right one,” I say.

“It would have been worth it if it took twenty.” Liam kisses me on the forehead, his hand squeezing my waist before he lets go. The words he’d said don’t, however.

They stay with me as we head to the register, as Liam adds the purple dress to the cashier with a hushed no to my protest, handing over his card.

They stay with me when he gives me a crooked smile and tells me to use his kitchen this weekend.

And when I try to sleep that night, with the big event the next evening, the look in his eyes plays over and over.

You match me. You always have.

The red dress floored me.

I know it’s materialistic of me, but hell, there is nothing like a woman in a sexy dress, and there’s nothing like a woman in a sexy dress who knows she’s sexy.

And that’s what Maddie had looked like, with the red dress clinging to her form. Accentuating the narrow waist, the delicate shoulders, the strength in her legs.

I lean my head back against the car seat and close my eyes. The want is growing stronger by the day, by every joke she makes and every taunting smile.

When I’d complimented her yesterday, with her standing in that changing room in only her underwear…

Her face had gone blank-like I’d shocked her to her core.

Like the implication of my joke was foreign to her. What else had I been able to do then, but to joke it away?

The door to my car opens and I blink my eyes open, only to see the real Maddie standing there.

And I’m reminded once again that my mind has flaws, because she’s ten times lovelier in person than in my memories.

“Hey there,” she says, smiling. “Were you sleeping on the job?”

“Very nearly.” Whatever magic she’s done to her face has made it luminescent, a lamp I should look away from but can’t. Her eyes are deeper, somehow, darker. Long, dark lashes sweep like the wings of a butterfly when she blinks.

And the red on her lips makes them look more fuckable than ever.

She looks a million miles away from the neighbor girl I’d grown up with, and yet so familiar it makes something inside of me ache with longing.

“You okay there, Carter?”

“Never been better,” I say, and by God do I mean it.

It takes us no time at all in the light Seattle traffic to arrive at Skye Hotel. Maddie slides her arm underneath mine and wobbles slightly on her heels.

“Sorry,” she murmurs. “I’m not used to walking in these things.”

“I’ll catch you if you fall,” I promise.

Her gaze tracks the hotel. “This place is pretty new, right? I’ve never been here before. Isn’t there a bookstore in the lobby?”

“Yes. It was opened just two years ago.” I snort. “Cole named it after his wife.”

“Wow,” Maddie breathes.

Does she find it romantic? Ostentatious? I can’t tell. “We almost forgot,” I say, sliding my hand into my coat pocket. “You have to wear your ring.”

Maddie smiles as she sees it, like she’s being reunited with a long-lost friend. “There you are, little guy. I’ve missed you.”

“I doubt he’s sentient.”

She covers her left hand with her right. “Not while he can hear you!”

“And to think you thought the ring was too much,” I tease, my eyes tracing the outlines of her lips. They’ve never looked fuller.

“He’s growing on me.”

And I’m growing on you, I think, my mind remembering the soft feel of her body in my arms. It had struck me at odd moments throughout the day, but it had never been as intrusive as right now.

“Are you ready to do this?” she whispers, waggling her eyebrows. “It’s showtime.”

“Break a leg,” I tell her, sliding my arm around her waist. “Except, don’t, considering the heels.”